1. 4296410-421640 Water: Novel by Bapsi sidhwa<br />Published in: 2006 <br />Genre: Fiction<br />Book Review <br />Winner of the Italian Premio Mondello 2007 for Foreign Authors! That’s the only novel from Pakistan written by Bapsi Sidhwa quot;
Pakistan's finest English-language novelistquot;
according to the New York Times Book Review. The novel ‘Water’ (2006) by Pakistan-born Houstonian, Bapsi Sidhwa has taken its script from the Deepa Mehta’s the most controversial film ‘Water’ (2005). Deepa Mehta asked Bapsi to write a novel based on her then-unreleased movie within three months and both, the novel and the film, released on April 28.<br />“Once widowed, a woman was deprived of her useful function in society – that of reproducing and fulfilling her marital duties,” this is what Bapsi Sidhwa states through the eyes of a seven years old girl Chuyia, quot;
Little Mouse,quot;
who is betrothed at age 6 with an elderly man, widowed at age 8 and abandoned at a widow's ashram. She has to live in ashram in contrition for all of her lives until her last breathe. The novel is set in 1938 in a pre-Independent, riotous India, against the milieu of Gandhi's rise to power. Later on Chuyia acts as a catalyst for the change of women’s life specially widow women in India, as her one widow friend Kalyani, a beautiful widow-prostitute, falls in love with a young, upper-class Gandhian idealist. Her affair is considered forbidden as it defies Hindu tradition and threatens to undermine the ashram' delicate balance.<br />Chuyia was living a carefree and gypsy’s life, wandering in field in search of leeches and berries when suddenly her life changed when at the age of seven, she got married to 44 years old widower, harilal, a Brahmin. As per the custom with wedded pre-pubescent girls, Chuyia lives in her parents’ home but at the same evening her husband dies and her hair are cut off and she is stripped of marriage markers, her red and green bangles and mangalsutra, is draped in a coarse homespun white cloth and left at an ashram for widows. She is shunned by her parents completely in the ashram. In the ashram, Chuyia experiences the strong and the weak, the corrupt and the honest, the victims and the victors, some minor themes of the story which deals with the feministic point of view at micro level. There, Chuyia befriends many widows like Shakuntala and Kalyani. Kalyani drowns herself when she tries to merry Narayan and finds that his father has been one customer of Kalyani. Chuyia is sent to some customer with Gulabi, a hijra. Shakuntala tries to save her but in vain. The story ends when Gandhi’s train passes through the village, Shakuntala tries to stop it with the help of people and hands Chuyia over to Narayan who is a follower of Gandhism.<br />Bapsi aptly illustrate the shackles of law and custom of Indian people for widows through the words of her various characters as Madhumati, the law-keeper of ashram asks Chuyia, “And when our husbands die, God help us, the wives also half die. So how can a poor half-dead woman feel any pain?” And Chuyia replies naively that because she is half-alive. Bapsi also criticize the patriarchy mind of the caste conscious “Mards” of Hindu society as at one place a Brahmin husband rages at his wife: quot;
A woman's role in life is to get married and have sons. That is why she is created: to have sons! That is all!quot;
<br />Bapsi also takes in account the Gandhism as a catalyst force for the colonial India in a sense that the ideas of Gandhi were threatening to the caste culture and religious traditional ideas of that Indian society as he preached people to abandon archaic Hindu laws like child marriage, the caste system, the shunning of widows and etc. at the end o the novel, she shows the passing of the train of Gandhi as a flicker of hope and bright future for the victims of punishing customs of traditions at the name of religion and Water ends on a tenuous note of hope.<br />Beside the Gandhism and miserable plight of Indian women, the novel also contains comical aspects. As Bapsi Sidhwa’s writings have “plenty of subtle humor in it (Bapsi, Arthur J. Pais June 06, 2006)” we can find many comic scenes at the part of Gulabi eunuch, who wears colorful dresses and makes the stress environment light.<br />Bapsi only takes in account the high class Brahman’s customs and we can find many instances of out of the ordinary status of Brahmans like quot;
Our holy texts say Brahmins can sleep with whomever they want, and the women they sleep with are blessed.quot;
This also bears witness of patriarchy, hypocrisy and double standards of Indian society. Women were treated lower than the men as according to Brahmins, “a woman is recognized as a person only when she is one with her husband. Outside of marriage the wife has no recognized existence, so, when her husband dies, she should cease to exist.” The most barbaric act Sati was outlawed in 1846 at the time of independence.<br />In spite of all the above discussion, still there are some points which remain unrequited that Bapsi only takes in account some customs for widows and not the all. It is to mention here that the poor widows were placed in ashrams on their own volition whereas the rich ones were being paid money by their families. So she couldn’t absorb the gist of the rules from the Manusmriti and also to understand that this is the book only for Brahmans and lower castes reject it completely. As I progressed through the impression of the title ‘Water’ remained vague. It seemed as if Mehta has adopted this title to conform with her trilogy, as the other two nature elements are the, Fire and Earth. But the question arises that what Water, being a nature element or the holy water denoting the omnipresence of the god, has to do with the widowhood in the novel? Along with it novel leaves some more questionable aspects but overall the novel is a must read book for the people who want to read something different from the themes of partition at the edge of Pakistan writers.<br />